Germany gets its first Pirate Party lawmaker

A member of Germany's Social Democrat party has defected for the Pirate Party, making him the first Pirate Party member in German parliament. Glyn explains, "Tauss left the Social Democrats after the party helped to pass a law mandating ISPs block a list of websites in a attempt to stop child porn. Tauss argues that it's the first step towards an extensive Internet censorship regimen and it will not work in its stated aim."

Tauss is being investigated for possession of child porn images that he says he downloaded as part of his ministerial investigation into the propagation of child porn.

Although Tauss is known for his experience in information technology matters and he has a track record in investigating child porn websites, he said the decision to give the government powers to close such sites down is a mistake.

He released a statement on Friday explaining his departure from the SPD, saying that although he agreed with many points of the party's programme, there was a "terrible wrong turn eing taken" in domestic, legal and internet policy.

He promised to continue to vote with the SPD in matters unrelated to these topics, but the party has demanded he step down from his parliamentary seat.

5 Responses to “Germany gets its first Pirate Party lawmaker”

The quoted text is factually wrong in that it states that Tauss is against the closing down of child porn sites.

He is very much in favor of closing down the sites by directly contacting the hosting provider, which can be done today without additional legislation since childporn is illegal in any country with a sufficiantly developed internet infrastructure for hosting such sites.

He is against introducing a block list that will only hide the sites from the inexperienced internet user and will not prevent any child from being abused.

thats awesome, “we need you to visit child pron sites and see how easy it is to get a hold of it, ya know, research it.”
then two or three years down the road when you disagree with the 1984 style of things….
“Your a child pron Kingpin!!!”””